Coral Springs boy, 11, catches suspect in hit-and-run crash

Peter Pappas, 11, chased a hit and run driver on foot and lead Broward Sheriff… (Michael Laughlin, staff )

January 13, 2012|By Wayne K. Roustan, Sun Sentinel

Peter Pappas wants to be a Navy SEAL when he grows up and the 11-year-old Coral Springs boy is putting together quite a resume. He saved his little brother from drowning, he raised money for a teenage girl's double lung transplant and now he helped catch a hit and run driver.

Peter ran after a white, four-door Suzuki as it left the scene of an accident in Tamarac around 2 p.m. on Thursday. The Parkside Elementary student caught up to it, got a partial tag number and led Broward Sheriff's deputies to the suspect's parked car where Gerald Joseph Veyvoda, 63, was arrested for leaving the scene of an accident and DUI among other charges, according to the arrest report.

"He was great and I got to be honest with you, without this kid's information we may never have found the guy, let alone to put him behind the wheel," Broward Sheriff's Deputy Daniel Lovallo said of Peter.

Apparently, Peter was acting on instinct. "I learned when I was a kid, when something's going bad I just go," he said matter of factly.

In this case, his mother Kim Pappas was driving him and his brother Spiro, 9, to the doctor's office and her car was southbound on North Pine Island Road, right behind Veyvoda's car. She witnessed the collision when Veyvoda turned into the path of a woman driving with a son about the same age as her boys.

"I was shocked. I told [my sons] to sit in the car because when the accident occurred I heard a child screaming and my mother instincts kicked in," Kim Pappas said. "I wanted to make sure the mother and child were OK."

Veyvoda also stopped to check on the woman and child in the other car and then left the scene.

"She hit my car and the bumper fell off," Veyvoda is quoted as saying in the accident report. "I saw him crying but I didn't think she was hurt so I just went home."

Peter saw Veyvoda driving off so he jumped out and gave chase.

"I knew I was running fast because I was almost up to the car but I don't know how fast the car was going," he said. "I can run fast when the [weather] is calm like that."

He was gone before his mother could do anything about it.

"It was kind of nerve-wracking because he just kept going and going and I just didn't know where he was going and then he came back and he said, 'I know where the guy lives, I followed him,'" she said.

Peter led deputies to an apartment complex on the 8500 block of Northwest 61st Street where he had no qualms about pointing out the car and the suspect just a few feet away, Lovallo said.

Peter may have done Veyvado a favor, Lovallo said.

"This guy is a very intelligent guy," he said. "He's had some troubles in his life and he completely admitted, 'I really need help, I'm going to get help, I'm going to get myself in a program.' So this kid may have turned this guy's life around."

It's not unusual for kids, or adults, to emulate superheroes they see in movies or video games, said licensed psychotherapist Fran Sherman. "Could he have seen heroism in movies or media? Absolutely."

But it was a real life news report that inspired Peter.

"I never heard the name Navy SEAL until I heard what happened to Osama bin Laden," he said. "What they did, I think, was impressive."

When he was 8 years old, he took up a daily collection at Broadview Elementary and raised $3,688 for Brieanna, a 13-year-old girl with cystic fibrosis who needed a double lung transplant.

When Peter was 5, his then-2-year-old brother Spiro took off his life jacket and jumped in the deep end of the family's backyard pool pretending he was Superman. But it was Peter who responded like the Man of Steel.

"I didn't know I could jump in the pool and hold him with one arm, keeping him above the water and paddle myself to the edge of the pool to hold him up," Peter said. "I was a young kid. I didn't have that much strength. I was five."

Sherman credits Peter's parents for raising a courageous son with strong self-esteem, but she cautions parents to stress good judgment as well.

"We catch kids doing something bad all the time but we caught a kid doing something really good and that should be recognized," Sherman said. "But we should also make people aware that we need to teach our kids to keep safe boundaries."